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Belgium Endive and Baby Spinach salad (lunch)

January 20, 2006 - At Sea

On the 20th, we had a sea day, and I uploaded a lot of photos, and incurred another $100 charge for another 250 minutes (my third $100 charge of this cruise). The internet is faster than I remember it being on the Crown, but is still a little unreliable, although I found a plug on the wall in the 6th floor atrium and could sit on the floor and log on from there.

I tried one last time to get them to switch us from room 388 to room 362 (our current room) or to room 364 across the hall, but they wouldn't do it. Bob continued to worry about how the move would be accomplished. I don't remember whether we went to Team Trivia, but I don't think we went to the show that night, or at least not together.

Dinner that night was formal, and they came and took a picture of us all. Bob was sort of trapped and couldn't get out of it. I had Oysters Rockefeller, Caribbean Bouillabaisse, and Surf and Turf (lobster tail, petit fillet mignon with asparagus and rice pilaf) for dinner. The waiters put on a show and marched around the dining room singing, and for dessert everyone had baked Alaska. The room steward did a cobra as a towel animal. Bob went to the last talk by the speaker (on volcanoes) by himself. I spend the time in the internet cafe.

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Dining room at breakfast

January 21, 2006 - At Sea

On the 21st, they had Breakfast Specials (Grilled Brockwurst, hominy grits and two eggs or Chocolate Chip French Toast or Cranberry Pancakes). I had the hominy grits.

The Front Desk stuck under the door the room keys for the new room (which assuaged one of Bob's fears about what would happen if we got locked out while moving), and gave us instructions for what to do the next day. We went up and got our pictures taken for the ship computers for the next cruise. If we were getting off, we were to use our old room key to get off and the new one to get on. But rain was forecast for Norfolk (and it did in fact rain) so we said we weren't getting off.

We went to the Cruise Director Doug Dunnell's debarkation talk, but none of it applied to us. The directions they gave us said to leave things on hangers, but Bob packed his bags anyway. The steward took away our collection of towel animals and also our fruit basket AND the little plastic thing that holds the shampoo bottles. (Do people take those? What for?)

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Our steward on the left

I went up to the photo gallery on the way to the last show - I got a free 8x12 photo as part of the package, and I picked up the one taken at the formal dinner the night before which was a 5x7, so they gave me a free post card to make up the difference. Prior to the main show was a crew 'review'. In the parade of the crew, our cabin steward was one of the first in that line, holding aloft a towel elephant wearing large sunglasses.

The show had a guy named Doug Mattocks (a musician), the 'physical' comedian (Tom Murphy) who wasn't much good, and a trumpet player Charles Raymond who was.

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Thimble Shoals lighthouse

December 22nd - Moving Day

We went past Cape Henry in the early dark, and Bob saw it but failed to waken me, so I missed it again. We had breakfast in the dining room, and then after our new room was cleaned, we moved all our suitcases and my hanging things. It worked pretty well actually although I had to ask several times for a plan of day. The only problem was - they didn't tell us our dinner table, although I knew we were early upper seating at 5:45.

I went out to the atrium on our deck and used up the last of my internet minutes - as soon as the first call came in for people to debark, I was cut off.

We had lunch in the Lido Buffet. It was overcast and rainy. Not many people are getting on in Norfolk - only about 500. The other 800 plus many children are getting on in Fort Lauderdale. We stopped by the dining room to see if they knew our table number, but their computer was down. I called the Front Desk to see if they knew and they said they would get back to me.

I went out and took photos of Norfolk again - we pulled out a little after 3. I went up to the Crows' Nest (deck 12) because I had to get in out of the wind which was pretty cold. I was hoping again to get a photo of Cape Henry Light this time, but it got darker and darker. I did get a reasonable photo of Thimble Shoals, but by the time we got within sight of Cape Henry it was fully dark (it gets dark at 1700 this time of year).

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Steamed mussels

There was a phone message from the Front Desk on the phone when I got back. She said just to go to the same table we had last time. (The phone in this room doesn't have a broken message light on it, and also the bathroom door actually closes without using major force on it.) I wanted to get my same seat (next to the window), so when it was dinner time, I slipped by the man asking for our dinner cards, and went with two older ladies to our table and sat in my seat. Bob was caught and they weren't going to let him go to the table unless he presented a card (which he didn't have) so they made him wait until they checked it out in the computer.

In addition to the two ladies (who were annoyed that they didn't have a large table for 10 or 12) there was a couple named Tom and Sue. Tom is my age. The dining room is nearly empty. I had steamed mussels (which Al had last cruise and looked good to me at the time and were good), baby spinach with mushroom salad, and Grilled Mahi Mahi with Roasted Corn Salsa and Plantains, rice and black beans (I didn't eat much of the beans). Bob also had the Mahi Mahi, and I ate his plantains (he doesn't like them). I had the chocolate cake for dessert.

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Carpaccio of beef tenderloin appetizer

December 23rd

It has been quite peaceful on the ship. Bob discovered that there was a menu for the TV which allowed him to set the on/off time for it, and he set it to go on at 7 am on the bow camera. It took us another day or so to figure out that we could set the sound to be softer too.

We went to trivia and teamed up with a lady named Sue with her foot in a cast and another lady. We won and the prize was luggage tags - there were about 5 teams tied with the same number of questions correct. She gave us two extra questions as a tie breaker. Each team got one right and one wrong. All of the other teams got correct the name of the bottled water that Napoleon authorized (Perrier), but we got that wrong. We were the only team though that got correct the location of the 1000 foot deep lake which I knew was somewhere in Central America and Bob remembered which country it was because we had the question on a previous trivia. The moderator decided that was the harder question (since we were the only ones who got it), so she gave it to us.

For dinner, I had the carpaccio of beef appetizer and the roast venison with poached figs and polenta as the main course. Bob had the hazelnut crusted black sea mullet. For dessert, Bob had the Key Lime Pie, and I had the no sugar added chocolate torte.

We went to the show after dinner, and it was a comedian named Frank King who was very funny.

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Ft. Lauderdale from the ship

Tomorrow - Ft. Lauderdale